A/N: I actually can't think of anything to put up here, other than I hope you enjoy the artwork that I've prepped for this chapter! If you check out the YouTube audio chapter, you can see the image more clearly, and you'll be able to see the hero names for all four girls from Team RWBY.

Now, let's find out what the heck happened to Kurai's eyes!

Phase 2: Chapter 3

Hard Work

Sweat poured out of Kurai's body in rivulets as he ducked, sidestepped, and wove around the fists of his opponent, the power of his quirk just barely keeping him out of harm's way. What is she made out of?! He thought as he cross-blocked Yang's fist before using the same hand to deal a back-fist that connected solidly with her mouth.

Unlike all of the other hits that he had managed to land on her that morning, this one saw her recoiling with a bloody lip. This told the boy that her power had run its course for the time being, otherwise she would have unleashed the same force back at him, twofold.

"Ah, punk!" Yang spat, a globule of blood exiting her lips as she backed away. Kurai held his position, but he did not drop his guard as she wiped at her face with a grimace. Looking at him begrudgingly, she added, "That's the signal that I've gone past the limits of my quirk. I need a breather."

"If it makes you feel any better, I was pretty close to tapping out, myself," he grunted as they sat in the dirt under a clear blue sky. "I think we've earned ourselves ten minutes on the ground."

"You said it."

They had been trading blows for three hours now, and it was only ten in the morning. Under the supervision of one of the other Pussycat heroes, a giant man named Tiger, they- along with Midoriya, and other strength-enhanced students from both first-year classes- were working to force their quirks to grow at an abnormally fast pace through brutal workouts. In fact, everyone from both classes had been given incredibly difficult- and often painful- tasks designed to enhance their powers, each of them being watched by one of the Pussycats, Aizawa, or Vlad King, class 1-B's strict teacher.

The only other students that had been directly pitted against one another so far were Kirishima and Ojiro, as it had been determined that this would be the most effective way for them to both build up their quirk's durability. Yang had been paired up with Kurai due to his raw, overwhelming power, and her ability to not only withstand such strength, but to deal it right back. He had not been using his energon blasts, having wanted to focus on keeping the energy flowing through his body for longer periods of time, now that he no longer had to worry about triggering an aneurism from overuse of his powers, though he knew that he would be made to work on his control of the energy output in the afternoon.

"I gotta say, Hikari," Yang panted as she tossed him a water bottle (Aizawa had allotted each student a single bottle to drink per hour), which he nearly missed because of how shaky his hands were. "You didn't strike me as the sturdy type."

"Am I supposed to take that as a compliment?" he asked before sipping at the fresh liquid. He had initially been on the end of receiving some pretty harsh blows himself, as Kurai was still more or less susceptible to distractions that girls like Yang tended to take advantage of. However, he had been quick to learn, and within thirty minutes of them sparring against each other, Yang was finding herself on the defensive just as often as her opponent.

"Sure, hot stuff," she grinned, causing him to flush a deeper red than the heat of the day had already left him. Seeing his reaction to her teasing, she added, "Jeez, how'd a shy guy like you manage to score a girl like Ashido? Or was it the other way around?"

"Other way around," he admitted before taking another drink. "I don't totally get it, myself, but I guess opposites attract, right? That, and we've been through a lot together."

"Oh yeah?" Yang sighed before taking a sip of water and then spitting out a mixture of it and the blood in her mouth. "I heard that you guys got caught up in a terrorist attack during your first month at U.A. And wasn't there something that happened on I-island last week?"

"Yeah," Kurai nodded, his eyes going dull as he remembered the events of that fateful night. Has it really only been a week since then?

"Dude, you okay?" Yang asked her sparring partner, jostling him by the shoulder to snap him back to the present. "Quit spacing out."

"Sorry, that incident is still kind of… fresh for me," Kurai said as he quaffed more of his water.

"Hey, believe it or not, my friends and I can relate to that," Yang told him, startling the boy a little. "No joke, Austin was attacked by this crime syndicate called the 'White Fang' a little while after the USJ incident. They started out as an equal-rights movement for people that don't have quirks, and when their peaceful protests didn't have the desired effect, they got violent."

"Sorry to hear that," Kurai said sympathetically. "How'd your sister handle the whole thing?"

"Ruby Rose wouldn't know how to stay down, even if she had both of her legs cut out from under her," Yang laughed. "She probably handled that whole mess better than the rest of us did. I know that she'll be a great hero someday."

"Is that her hero name?" Kurai asked.

"What?"

"Ruby Rose," he repeated. "It's a good one- alliterative, easy to remember, rolls off the tongue."

"Actually, her hero name is 'Crescent Rose'," Yang explained. "Rose is her actual last name."

"Wait, you're- Er, that is to say…?" Kurai stopped himself, unsure if he was being rude in his assumptions.

"We have different moms," Yang shrugged nonchalantly. "She kept her mom's name, I kept our dad's. It's no big deal- we're used to it, and we couldn't be closer even if we were fully related."

"You're certainly… forthcoming," Kurai said uncertainly. "Do you always talk about your family situation this easily?"

"No, but I'm not shy, either," she grinned. "Besides, we're all gonna be classmates for at least a semester- I'm all for trying to be friends with you guys, and that means talking about this kind of thing, right?"

"I guess?" Kurai shrugged. "I'm not exactly an authority on social interactions… But in the interest of getting to know you guys a little better- preferably with subject material that's less sensitive- what's your hero name?"

"Way to be subtle," Yang chuckled as she set down her water bottle, now empty. "But I like being straightforward, myself. My hero name is 'Firecracker'."

"Really?" Kurai asked as he swallowed some more water. When she gave him a pointed look, he held up his free hand and said, "Hey, it's a good name. I just thought that there would somehow be a pun involved."

"Well, I'm usually able to punch people pretty hard, so I originally wanted to call myself 'Go Long', cos-"

"Your name, yeah, I get it," Kurai said with a roll of his eyes. "Nice."

"I got vetoed by the rest of my team," she grumbled as she rubbed at a sore spot in her shoulder.

"Well, Firecracker is definitely a way to get people's attention," Kurai grinned as he made to finish his own water. "Now I'm just curious about how you picked that name?"

"Well, truth be told, it's an old nickname," Yang admitted. "My uncle's been calling me that since I was little, and he taught me and Ruby a lot about fighting, so… Yeah."

"That's cool that you'd pay homage to him that way," Kurai commented with an approving nod.

Yang rolled her eyes before she asked, "So, what name are people gonna be calling when you're patrolling the streets?"

For once, he managed to easily return a smile and say with confidence, "My hero name is 'Kai', like the guardians of old."

"Hikari, Xiao Long," Aizawa said dryly as he walked by without looking at them. "If you can talk, you can keep fighting. Get to it, before I put you in with the other exam failures for extra classes tonight."

Once he was out of earshot, Kurai muttered, "Much as I like spending extra time with Mina, that is one date I'd be happy to skip."

"Hey, Ashido!" Yang called over to where Mina and Jiro were training. "Your boyfriend says-!"

"Rasengan!"

"Sir?" Midoriya said tiredly, not sure that he had heard Mister Aizawa correctly.

"You're training with Belladonna until lunchtime," the man said with irritation. "Ask me to repeat myself a third time, and there won't be a lunch break for you."

"Yes sir!" Midoriya yelped. "Sorry sir!"

Aizawa turned to go before he paused and said over his shoulder, "You're good at taking in what's around you, but you're too slow to apply it in combat for all that knowledge to be practical just yet. Miss Belladonna's quirk should be uniquely suited for helping you to adapt rapidly in a fight."

"Why, what's her quirk?" he asked as he staggered after the teacher, his abused muscles complaining mightily as he did. Despite his attempts to ask about it at dinner the previous evening, Blake's power was the only one that he hadn't been able to learn about from her classmates due to various interruptions, and the girl herself had seemed pretty unapproachable.

"You're smart, figure it out," Aizawa replied as he stopped in front of the trees, his haggard eyes searching the branches for something, Midoriya could not tell what. "Miss Belladonna, I'll ask that you come down before I have to use my quirk to find you."

There was a whisper of movement, and suddenly Blake was standing in front of the two of them, startling Midoriya enough to elicit a yelp out of him. Raising an eyebrow at him, Blake turned to Aizawa and asked, "How can I help you, sir?"

"Midoriya needs to shape up in how he uses his quirk to fight," the teacher answered bluntly. "See if you can show him a thing or two."

"How would I go about doing that, sir?" she asked, looking a little nonplussed by the whole idea.

"Start by beating him up," Aizawa replied as he walked away from the unlikely pair. "Don't get cocky while you do, though. He's quick to adapt."

Once he was gone, Midoriya scratched his head and turned back to look at Blake, who was still wearing a passive face. "So… how should we start training?" he asked awkwardly.

"Let me know when you're ready to begin, and we can start fighting," the girl answered, her golden eyes looking at him unblinkingly, studying him with a meticulous precision that was a little unnerving for Midoriya. "I'm ready when you are."

"Okay, then," he said as he took up a fighting stance that Hikari had shown him, his body lighting up with green energy as he prepared a Detroit Smash. "I'm ready!" Two seconds later, he was on the ground with a bruise forming on his stomach, gasping for air. "What…?" he wheezed. I never even saw her move! He thought as he looked up at Blake, who had a slightly bemused expression on her face as she reached out a hand to help him up. One second she had been standing in front of him, seemingly without a care in the world, and the next, he had been painfully blindsided.

"You're advertising your attacks too much," the black-haired girl said as he accepted her help up. "You need to let your body move without thinking about it."

"Funny you should say that…" he laughed weakly as he thought back to the day when All Might had told him that he would be named as his successor.

"What?"

"Nothing, I was just thinking out loud," Midoriya answered. "I'm confused, though. How am I advertising my attack before I've even started?"

"The way you were drawing your fist back made it pretty obvious," Blake said blandly as Iida and Ruby raced by, rose petals mixing with the dust cloud that they were kicking up. "When you fight, you need to be moving your whole body the whole time. Keep your opponent guessing as much as possible, and don't rely on your quirk to do all the fighting. It's as much in the mind as anything else."

"How do you know so much more about fighting than us?" he then asked as she took a few steps away from him. "We're both first-years."

"All the members of Team RWBY have earned their American provisional licenses," Blake answered. "We need to earn our Japanese licenses if we want to do hero work while we're here, but we've already been through some pretty brutal training. It's pretty much the only reason that Mister Aizawa took our applications."

"Oh, that makes sense," Midoriya muttered. Squaring his shoulders, he let the power of One For All flow through him again as he settled into his fighting stance and said, "Let's do this. I'm gonna surpass you and your friends, just you watch."

"It's good to have a goal," Blake said with the hint of a smile as she assumed a ready stance. "But it's not gonna be achieved just because you say it will."

"Okay, let's see if I've still got it," Kurai muttered as he stood atop one of the small mountains constructed by Pixie Bob's Earthflow quirk. He could see Sero and Koda working to enhance their own powers in their own ways on top of similar constructs, both of them looking about as tired as he felt.

Pushing them out of his mind and ignoring the burning in his muscles, he brought his hands to his side and willed his power to pool between them, quickly generating a ball of energon that rapidly grew in response to his command. Here we go…

"Kamehameha!" His shout preceded a yellow laser that flew up into the stratosphere, piercing the clouds, and continuing on up into the heavens. He held the beam for as long as he could, only stopping when his bruised arms would no longer support their own weight. It wasn't as long as he would have liked, but on the plus side, he didn't feel any pressure building in his head, mental or physical.

Good, but let's see if we can do it again.

Resolved to go beyond, he conjured a dozen Kamehameha's in the next ten minutes, each one lasting less time than the last, but only because Kurai's quirk was genuinely being worn down. This was a first for him, as he had struggled for most of his life to keep his powers repressed so that he didn't hurt others, or accidentally kill himself from overuse. As such, he had never really hit the physical limits of his body, only that of his frontal cortex.

The previous day, he had avoided trying to unleash monster blasts, as he did not want to destroy the forest too much, so he had remained uncertain about releasing so much power at once. Now though, he was finally certain in his brother's handiwork in re-engineering the physical applications of his quirk. He was truly free from the curse that had plagued him since childhood.

Now that I know that my body can take me putting out as much power as I can, I'd better start on those other possibilities that he told me about…

Akarui had explained to him in an email that despite the fact that he would be able to use his powers without fear of death coming for him, there was a cost for such an exchange. Kurai's quirk could still be triggered by rage if he so chose, but it would no longer unlock the full potential of his quirk for him. If he wanted to ascend to greater heights, he would have to take a new path to attain it.

Sitting down in a meditative pose, he ignored the protests of his legs and closed his eyes. It had been a long time since he'd given himself time to meditate properly- probably since he started school, now that he thought about it. He had once insisted on making himself do it three times a week for an hour each time, as to better keep a hold of his emotions and powers. With all the new workloads, new friends, villain attacks, and spending time with his girlfriend, it had simply fallen out of his habits.

Looks like I'm going to have to make time to get back in the habit, he thought as he began to tune out all the noise that was attempting to distract him from his task at hand. Bakugo's explosions and curses, Iida's engines, Koda's Anivoice, the various groans of distress coming up from the majority of the students in the camp- he sifted through each sound and forced it to mean nothing to him.

When he had finally succeeded, he reached for his power and thought, Now, what to focus on…?

Weiss collapsed onto her seat as the dozen or so glyphs of varying color and size around her vanished from existence. She was working to increase not only the number of hexes that she could produce, but also sustaining the different types that she had been able to master thus far. It was hot, unpleasant work, and she hated it.

I thought that this place was supposed to be for honing our technical skills, not bulldozing our way to victory through raw strength, she thought as she wiped at her brow with a small measure of disgust as soon as she saw the heavy sweat line on her hand. Pulling at the fabric of her P.E. uniform, she added, These clothes are so stifling, especially in this heat. I wish we could practice with our hero costumes.

She grimaced as a blast of heat assaulted her from the right, followed by a more pleasant chill that reminded her of evenings back at home, spent with her sister, Winter. I hope she was right, that this would be a good experience for me, she thought despondently as another heat blast erupted from her right. Maybe she'll have a few minutes to talk once we get back to Musutafu.

Wiping some strands of hair out of her face, she welcomed another chill as Todoroki strained to keep alternating the temperature of the water in the rain barrel water that he was sitting in. I think Winter would like him, she thought as she forced herself to her feet. He's strong, determined, with excellent grades… If only there were more students like him and me.

When at long last, six o' clock rolled in, the students were released from their physical labors and called in to a spot on the western side of the building, where they were presented with a new challenge.

"Remember what I said?" Pixie Bob reminded them as she and the fourth member of the Cats- a woman with green hair called Ragdoll- stood in front of several tables backed with fire stoves. "We're not serving your food anymore!"

"You wanna eat, you gotta work for it!" Ragdoll said excitedly. When all the student body did was groan collectively, she laughed gleefully at them and added, "Aw man, you guys should see your faces! You look totally wiped! But don't think that you can coast by making sloppy cat food!"

Alone among the forty-odd students, Iida perked up and said, "Ah, yes, of course! As tired as we are, it's the perfect time to cultivate our culinary skills! After all, should we find the opportunity to rescue people physically, we should also be ready to care for their spiritual needs!" Turning to the other students, he called out, "Let's make the most delicious curry in the world, everyone!"

"…Okay."

"Hey sweetie, can you get me some wood for the fire?" Mina asked as she noticed her boyfriend staring blankly at his hand. "Kurai?"

"Hmm?" he asked slowly as he dropped his hand and turned toward her, a befuddled look on his face. "Sorry, what's that?"

"You know where the firewood is?" she asked him with a light grin. "We're gonna need it to get the meat cooking."

"Oh, uh, sure," he said uncertainly as he turned around and began to walk toward the side of the building. "Just gimme a minute."

"Kay, no rush," she giggled. That is, until she noticed something odd in his behavior.

At first she couldn't quite put her finger on what was off, but as she watched him get further away from her, she noticed that he was consistently keeping a hand on whichever table was next to him, though he wasn't leaning on it. Now, what was really strange was the fact that once he passed the last table, his gait slowed down considerably, and while he was still heading in the right direction, he seemed to be unable to walk in a straight line to get there.

I know he got enough sleep last night, she thought quickly. He took his medicine, and Midoriya said that he slept like a log the whole night, as far as they all know. So what's he doing?

Her smile gone, she nudged Uraraka and pointed with her chin to ask, "Does he look right to you?"

Her friend watched him reach the wall- which he nearly walked into- and then stooped down in order to unsteadily gather a small pile of wood into his arms. Letting out a small gasp, she then whispered, "Ashido, I don't think he can see."

"Crap, I was hoping that it was just me," the pink girl said as she paled to a sickly taffy color. "Help me get him when you can, but have Yaomomo cover our fire, first."

"Sure," Uraraka nodded. "Go on ahead."

With that, Mina walked just fast enough so that it didn't look like she was in a rush, catching her boyfriend by the arm, and startling him almost enough to drop the wood he was carrying. "Mina?" he gasped. "Jeez, don't scare me like that."

"Dude, it's way light out," she said as she started taking the wood off of his hands. "I'm the one that should be getting worked up, since my boyfriend suddenly can't see! Also, he didn't say anything about it!" At the last part, she fairly yanked the rest of the wood out of his grip, causing him to stumble and fall to his knees for a second.

She felt shame wash over her as he struggled back to his feet, but fortunately, no one had noticed their little argument just yet. "I'm sorry," she apologized quickly. "That was mean."

"My fault for making you worry," he said with a slightly crooked grin as he looked just to her left after straightening himself up. "I know my quirk has been a big concern for you lately, but I promise it's not as bad as you think it is."

"How is you losing your sight not a bad thing?!" she hissed, though she was quieter about it this time. "Dude, I'm gonna start having gray hair before my mom on account of you! What're we gonna tell the teachers?!"

"It's not lost," he said with a placating gesture. "And while I didn't know that it would be this bad, I do know that it's not permanent. I couldn't see anything at all when we were first called in, but now I can see most of the colors and vague shapes around me. Honestly, the headache is what's really throwing me off."

"Hikari?" Uraraka asked as she approached, causing Kurai to look in between her and Mina, his eyes narrowed as he desperately tried to make out the details of her appearance. "Are you okay?"

"I'm just gonna save myself some time and tell you both what I was gonna tell Mina," he said tiredly. "The long and short of it is that while overusing my quirk doesn't put my life in danger, something else had to take the hit in my body. You can't have a quirk as powerful as mine without there being some serious potential recoil, according to Akarui. In this particular case, the 'something else' was my eyesight."

"So… overusing your quirk makes you blind, now?" Mina asked him incredulously. "That doesn't make any sense! Your eyes have nothing to do with your quirk!"

"They do with the new technique I'm working on," he shrugged, surprising his classmates. "It was all in that email that my brother sent right before we left yesterday. Remember that?" When the girls assured him that they remembered, he continued, "When I use my quirk in its base format, I'm definitely stronger than I used to be, no doubt about that. However, I'm still not as strong as I was when I fought that villain alongside Midoriya and All Might, nor will I ever be again- at least, not in that way."

"What does that mean?" Uraraka asked, still feeling supremely confused.

"When my brother rewrote the neural pathways in my body to alter the way that it handles my power, one of the changes that occurred happens to be the part of my brain that triggers the ascension power," he explained. "Now that trigger is apparently tied into the chakra points in my body. He told me to focus on my 'Ajna' chakra while trying to channel my quirk, and the best way for me to do that was to keep my eyes shut while I did."

"So… you can power up, but only by closing your eyes?" Mina asked. "This is still not making sense."

"Honestly, I'm with you," Hikari grinned slightly. "If it weren't for the fact that he sacrificed his ability to be autonomous to change my powers, I would have thought that he was talking out of his ass. But since he knows more about what happened to my quirk than I do, I figured it would be better if I follow his instructions. So, with this new method, I deprive myself of my eyes in exchange for another sense that takes its place, one that even surpasses my normal optical input. Focusing my Energon through the Ajna while my eyes are completely inoperative- for lack of a better word- and projecting it out around me in constant waves, I can more or less echolocate my surroundings. I can see people, the ground, the animals, the plants, everything, in every direction, all at once."

"Wow, that sounds like it's be hard to keep track of," Uraraka said, sounding impressed.

"It really is," Kurai laughed a little dryly. "That's why I've got a killer migraine. My head isn't used to taking in so much data at once, and in a new format, no less.

"As for my eyes, they're … adjusting, I guess? I mean, I completely ignore them in exchange for a superior sixth sense, so I guess my body has to readjust to the normal input of information. Akarui said that something like that might happen."

"Might?"

"Hey, I'm okay," Kurai assured Mina as he looked right at her and grabbed her by the shoulders. "My eyes aren't damaged. They're just waking up, I promise. I just need to get a better handle on this new ability so I can get good enough to fight with it, and hopefully reduce the recoil effects of the power." Adding a crooked grin, he then said, "I'll take this over brain surgery any day. Trust me, I owe my brother big time for working this out the way that he did."

"Just… stop scaring me, okay?" Mina urged him. "I worry about you."

Kurai raised his eyebrows and replied, "I wish I could promise that, but we're training to be heroes, remember? I can't promise not to scare you any more than you can swear not to worry me. But I can promise to let you know before I start experimenting with new powers. Does that work?"

"Only because you're so cute," she agreed reluctantly. "Uraraka, mind getting this idiot over to a bench? I'll ask the Pussycats if they have any painkillers."

"Yeah, no sweat," she said as Mina walked away with the firewood. While she guided their friend to a nearby bench, she asked, "How were you able to make it back to camp without anyone knowing that you couldn't see? I mean, nobody's said anything."

"I had to slide down the hill that Pixie Bob made for me, since there was no way I could walk it," Kurai grinned. "I just listened for the direction that all the voices were heading toward, and aimed for that. Once I got to ground level, I could kind of make out our classmates because of the blue uniforms, so I just followed everyone else."

"Why didn't you say anything?" Uraraka inquired as they reached one of the benches, and helped him to sit down.

"Honestly, I thought I could hide it well enough that no one would notice until I got back to normal," he answered wryly. "Now Mister Aizawa is probably gonna put me in the extra lessons with the others."

"And why would that be?" a familiar voice asked from behind Uraraka, causing both students to stiffen in place. "You have something you wanna tell me, Hikari?" When the students were both silent, Aizawa added, "Maybe it's something you'd prefer to be discussed in private?" The way he said it made Kurai feel as though he wouldn't have much of a choice if he tested his teacher's patience any further.

"My eyesight has been temporarily crippled, sir," Kurai admitted. "I was trying something new with my quirk to enhance my abilities, and I discovered an unfortunate side effect."

"…I'm going to need to get a urine sample from you, Hikari," Aizawa said after an awkward stretch of silence.

"Excuse me?"

"As the son of a police officer, I'm sure you understand how drug tests work," the teacher replied flatly.

Suddenly, Kurai regretted the way that he had phrased what had happened. "Okay, bad choice of words," he said with a rueful grin. "Trust me when I say that you've got the wrong idea. All I meant was that I was testing out my quirk's practical application in a way that I haven't before. The only drugs I'd have in my system is the stuff that Recovery Girl prescribed to me, and those don't cause optical failure."

"Neither does your quirk, according to the citizen's registry," Aizawa muttered. "I'd like to believe you, but I'm afraid I can't just take your word for it."

"Mister Aizawa, Hikari would never-!"

"Stay out of it, Uraraka," Aizawa said sternly, instantly quieting the girl. "Like I said, I want to believe him. If he's really done nothing wrong, then he should have no problem complying with the test. I have a kit in my room, so we can get this over with quickly. Hikari, if you'll follow me."

"Yes sir," the boy grumbled, resigned to what would be an uncomfortable test. Still, he knew better than to argue with the pessimistic instructor.

"Oh, something else," Aizawa added as Kurai began to follow him unsteadily. "If you really are clean, then I'm gonna need an explanation for why your quirk would suddenly change itself. If I think that you're lying, or hiding the truth in any way, you'll be expelled from U.A. immediately."

Aw, crap baskets.

It wasn't until dinner was well under way that Kurai returned to the outdoor grill area, looking disgruntled in the extreme. He made his way over to where Mina was sitting with some of their other friends, and took his spot next to her.

"Hey, Ochaco told me what happened," she said worriedly as he began to dig into the curry that they made. "Did everything work out okay?"

"You could say that," he said through a mouthful of food. After he had washed it down with some water, he added, "I passed the drug test, naturally, but that meant that I had to tell him about what Akarui did to fix my quirk."

"You what?!" Mina coughed, nearly choking on her own meal. Around them, Uraraka, Iida, and even Todoroki looked alarmed at the news.

"He was not happy, to say the least," Kurai sighed. "But given that it happened outside of his jurisdiction, he says that he's not in a position to punish me for it. He also said that he thinks that my brother's condition is punishment enough."

"That's rather harsh, even for him," Iida said with a slight frown.

"So… that's it?" Uraraka asked hopefully. "He didn't expel you?"

"No, but he did warn me that I'll be on eggshells for as long as I'm his student," he grumbled. "I thought that was already the case."

"I'm just glad you're not going anywhere," Mina said in relief.

"Yeah, I know Deku would be pretty upset if you had to leave, and so would I," Uraraka added.

"Speaking of, where is he?" Kurai asked as he looked around, failing to notice the mess of green hair that marked his friend's presence. "My eyes are fine now, but I still don't see him."

"He said that there was something that he needed to look into," Iida answered. "He's only been gone about ten minutes."

"Well, his loss," Kurai shrugged. "I'ma eat his curry if he doesn't come back in time."

"Kurai!"

"What?! I'm hungry!"

"Yang, have you seen Ruby?" Weiss asked as she looked around for the fourth member of their team. "She was supposed to help me with my winter costume design."

"Pretty sure she found something more fun to do," Yang snickered. "Turns out my little sister has more game than I thought she did."

Blake and Weiss exchanged a puzzled look before the white-haired girl asked, "I'm sorry… what?"

"I saw her and that Midoriya guy sneaking off that way about ten minutes ago," Yang said as she jerked a thumb over her shoulder. She seemed to be indicating a path that led deep into the woods, which began just to the side of the grills.

This alarmed both of the other girls, enough so that Blake asked, "Shouldn't we stop them?"

"I swear she gets more reckless every day!" Weiss hissed.

"Oh, come on," Yang said easily. "They're both giant dorks, so I doubt that they'd actually be up to anything- not to mention that I'd break his legs if he tried. They're probably just geeking out about quirks and costumes, wherever they are."

"Midoriya did seem pretty shy," Blake admitted. "Still, I can't believe you're being so calm about this."

"Pfft, I'm always calm."

"Junior's nightclub begs to differ."

"Shut up, Weiss!"

"Look at all of them, so carefree," a young man with hideous burn scars said as he looked down at the glowing camp site from atop a cliff. "So self-assured in their cradle of fame and fortune that they believe themselves safe, simply because they will it."

"But we'll change that, won't we, Dabi?" asked a young woman in a red dress that stood beside him. Golden firelight gleamed in her right eye, the one good eye that she had left as she watched the peaceful forest alongside the burned man. "We'll eat away at their sense of comfort until there's nothing left but the harsh, cold reality of their powerlessness."

"Ugh, just let me loose already!" growled a towering, beefy man.

"Must… eat soon…" added a ghoulish, mummified figure, whose only visible features were his razor-sharp teeth. "Need… meat! Raw, hot… flesh!"

"All of you, calm down," Dabi ordered them. "We don't move until Kurogiri gives us the signal. If we don't do this carefully, like when they failed to properly prepare for the USJ attack, our mission will be over before it really begins."

"Meh, as I long as I get to see some blood, I'm happy to wait," said a girl in school uniform as she twirled a couple of surgical knives between her fingers. "But only for a little bit."

"I'm bored, lemme go at 'em!" shouted a man dressed in a black-and-gray bodysuit. "Patience is a part of the job," he added calmly.

"Please tell me that we won't have to wait much longer," the woman in red said with lowered tones to Dabi. "I can hardly think straight with all these nutcases trying to find excuses to run off on their own."

"Tomorrow, Cinder," Dabi answered as his blue eyes glittered maliciously. "Tomorrow will mark the end of society's trust in the so-called heroes of today."

Mataras: And... mic drop.

Kai: So that's what Akarui did to relieve the stress on my brain... Interesting.

Deku: Wait, we're not gonna talk about the extra villain that showed up?!

Kai: What's to talk about? We kinda knew that this was coming, given that we have extra heroes on our side now. I'm more intrigued by the recent development concerning Energon.

Mataras: And this is only the beginning. If our readers will remember the concept art of you wearing Akarui's invention, they might recall the fact that there were seven symbols on the neck piece, each of a different color.

Deku: Did each one represent a different chakra?

Mataras: Bingo. Don't ask me how Akarui did what he did, though. I don't think he could explain it in a way that would make sense to the rest of us mortals.

Kai: Hold on a sec, though. If you're sending me on a path that deals with chakra points, aren't we kind of starting out on the wrong foot?

Mataras: How so?

Deku: Traditionally, people deal with the chakra points starting from the base of the spine, and working the way up to the dome of the head, don't they?

Mataras: I'm not totally sure on that one, but I think it stands to reason that certain chakra points can be unclogged in no particular order for different people. Take Kurai, for example. Having been raised by a person who sees the ugliness of the world on a regular basis, he has no room for delusions, especially those that some inflict on themselves. To me, it seemed reasonable that his Ajna chakra would already be clean and ready for use.

Kai: On the other hand, my Sahasrara-

Deku: What now?

Kai: The seventh chakra, the one that is related to enlightenment and is blocked by emotional attachments to worldly concerns. I can see myself having a hard time unlocking that one.

Mataras: Yeah... I mean, your relationship with Mina notwithstanding, being a hero means that you have to be aware of many worldly issues and committing yourself to resolving them. Doesn't leave a lot of room for detachment, does it?

Kai: True. But I assume you'll have some clever workaround to have me unlock it?

Mataras: Not really...?

Deku: I don't know that I buy that.

Kai: Me neither.

Mataras: I'll get back to you on that one. In the meantime, let's give our readers a hint as to what's coming next.

Deku: Next time- A Chat About the Heart

Kai: Is this a filler chapter?

Mataras: It'll be fluffy, but it'll also be very important for a couple of characters that we all know and love.

Deku: Who's that?

Mataras: ...Go Beyond!

Kai: Plus Ultra!

Deku: No seriously, who are you-?!

Next time on Your Hero Academia...

As class B dispersed into the woods, Kurai took a long look at Uraraka's moping expression before groaning inwardly and resigning himself to what he knew he should do. Walking quickly before his courage deserted him, he approached her and asked, "Hey, can we talk?"

"Uh…? Sure?" the rosy-cheeked girl said as they stepped away from the main group. Once they were relatively out of earshot, she asked, "What's up? I guess it's not a big secret that I'm kind of chicken when it comes to this stuff, but I'll be okay, really."

"No, this has nothing to do with the test," he said with a negative motion of his hand. Glancing around once more to make sure that they had privacy, he sighed deeply before saying, "I'm not very good at this stuff, but you're friends with Mina, and since she isn't here for you right now, I figured that I should probably try to say something in her place."

"Hikari, what are you talking about?" Uraraka asked him, looking more confused than ever. "What's Mina got to do with this?"

"…Okay, you're right, she shouldn't have anything to do with this," Kurai sighed heavily, adding even more confusion to the girl's face. Seeing this, he quickly added, "I should say this as your friend, not on behalf of my girlfriend- I mean, we are friends, right?"

"Yeah, totally!" Uraraka said with a cheerful smile that seemed more in keeping with her usual self. "Sorry if that wasn't clear before now!"

"It was, I'm just a socially inept moron," Kurai chuckled, though he grew serious again, causing Uraraka's face to sober up. "But there's something that I've had on my mind for a while now, and I think it's time that I give it voice, especially after seeing how you've acted around Midoriya the last few days."